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marpaige's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Drug use, Sexual content, Grief, and Alcohol
Moderate: Death and Death of parent
Minor: Toxic relationship
jayden_130607's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, Drug use, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, and Alcohol
jules_c's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Cursing, Death, Sexual content, Grief, and Alcohol
Moderate: Drug use, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Car accident, Death of parent, and Gaslighting
Minor: Addiction and Vomit
zabeishumanish's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Diverse cast of characters? No
4.0
A groan lodges in my throat. My Friday night went from hot threesome sex to babysitting my best friend's girlfriend's best friend. (Dean's POV, 12)
Graphic: Death, Sexual content, and Grief
Moderate: Cancer, Toxic relationship, and Gaslighting
cassiereadsbooks_'s review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Graphic: Toxic relationship and Gaslighting
lifeonasofa's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Graphic: Death, Drug use, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Grief, Death of parent, and Alcohol
Minor: Car accident
jj_readstoomuch's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
...It’ll take more than flashy moves to win her over."
Allie Hayes is nursing a broken heart but ends up on the rebound. She spends one night with Dean Di Laurentis, the king of one-night stands, and the rest is history. Just like the previous two books, The Score is pretty much the standard romance book. However, I didn’t enjoy this one as much as the others.
The plot for this book was fairly predicable as it was so similar to her previous books in the series. A girl goes through a life changing event, she catches the eye of the bad boy hockey player, they try to resist each other and then boom, they fail. I know this is pretty much the basis for a lot of romance books out there (don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with a good old good girl/bad boy trope) but the writing itself just seemed quite repetitive. At times I often felt like I was having deja vu because it just seemed like I'd read the exact same story before. However, the author has said that you can read these books as standalones. In my opinion, you wouldn't understand parts of book 3 without reading book 2 and you wouldn't understand parts of book 2 without reading the first book etc. so I'm glad I read them as a series.
The main characters in this book are Allie Hayes and Dean Di Laurentis. I personally just didn't gel with these characters as much as I did with the main characters from the previous books in the series.
Allie is ok. There are certain aspects of her personality that I find admirable, like her loyalty towards others. However, that also happens to be her downfall. She's loyal to a drastic fault and puts others' needs before her own. I did like Allie's character development. She became more certain about what she wanted and did things for her self, knowing that it would impact other characters, and didn't second-guess herself.
Dean. The only thing we really learn about Dean in the previous books is that he's a massive player, a humongous flirt and is very rich. In this book, you don't learn much more about Dean until maybe the last third of the book when a major event happens (no spoilers) and you see how he handles it and how his character develops because of it. I'm not a massive Dean fan despite how he's made out to such a popular person in the book. I found his personality to be quite garish and stereotypical. Yes, he has a character arc and grows as a person as we reach the end of the book but I don't know, his character just isn't for me.
As for other characters, we see more of Garratt and Hannah, Logan and Grace and more side characters from the previous books (which is why I would recommend reading the books as a series and in order). One character we didn't read a lot about in this book though is Tucker. He had the odd piece of dialogue and then dropped a major bombshell at the end of the book so I'm guessing book 4 is going to be about Tucker. We don't really know alot about this character besides that he's the 'mum' of the group and is a decent cook so I'm looking forward to reading more about him in the next book.
Ultimately, I thought this book was okay overall. A bit repetitive with the scenarios and writing but learning more about the different characters and how their lives have progressed at Briar University was very interesting. Overall, I'd probably rate this book 3.5 / 5 stars. It wasn't a bad book by any means but it didn't make me go all giddy and stay hooked like the previous books. I would recommend reading this book if you don't mind a bit of repetitiveness or if you're going to read it as a standalone. I would also recommend this book (and the series as a whole) to adults (18+) as it contains explicit content and tackles some pretty heavy issues throughout.
Graphic: Chronic illness, Cursing, Drug use, Sexual content, and Alcohol
Moderate: Cancer, Death, Toxic relationship, Grief, Car accident, and Death of parent
Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Mental illness, Violence, and Vomit
wellreadjill_'s review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Moderate: Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Misogyny, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Grief, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
itsmeyseniab's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
The main reason that I ended up giving this one 3.5 stars is because it felt as though Elle Kennedy was throwing the most ridiculous conflicts at the end to give the characters more depth. There were multiple times at the end when I put the book down and laughed, not because the situation was particularly funny, but just because I was so flabbergasted by the huge downer at the end when the first 80% was lighthearted and sexy. I also appreciated the character growth that Elle Kennedy attempted to display, specifically with Allie, but it didn't pack as much of a punch due to my feelings on the spoiler I mentioned above.
All in all I'm still having a fabulous time with this series and can't wait to pick up the next one!
Graphic: Sexual content and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Drug use
Minor: Cancer, Death, Car accident, and Death of parent
mention of multiple sclerosisagnesbebon's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
Ok this isn’t going to be nice and I feel kinda bad about it. These are most of my thoughts on this book so it’s a little chaotic and really long.
First, some things I liked:
-This book made me love Garrett and Hannah even more. Especially Garrett. The problem with this is it is not their book and they felt like equally main characters.
-I genuinely laughed at loud at some parts!!
- I loved Allie and Dean getting together, and they really did have me at some points.
-I liked the overall idea of this plot more than the others (emphasis on idea)
-Dean running to the rescue? Yes love it. Dean after the cops were called? Phenomenal
- Parts of it were really hot I gotta give Elle Kennedy that
- Huge spoiler: there was great development after Beau’s death but this should’ve come sooner
Some quick issues:
I hated the twincest moment. There was a weird brief juice cleanse promo. I never want to hear “jiggle down” again. Did not like the reference to Tr*mp. This book was significantly more male gaze-y than the last two. There were weird race jokes.
Things that made me mad (this book genuinely made me angry):
- I hate saying things made me cringe, but the writing in this made me cringe. Like what was “she’s probably ovaries-deep in a carton of ben and Jerry’s right now” hated that.
- This is my number one issue with this book: there were too many goddamn side characters and mini plots. The entire middle of this book was just introducing characters for the next book/ Briar U series. Even the ending wasn’t about Allie and Dean. This book is quite frankly not about Allie and Dean. The first half gave me what I wanted. Then they introduced wayyy too many people and the plot was completely lost
- Miranda’s plot (coaches daughters ex thing) was not developed enough for what Kennedy was trying to do. The coach straight up did not need to be in the book - literally nothing came of it.
- There was like barely any hockey in this book?? After reading The Mistake and The Score, I realize a huge reason why I really like The Deal is the amount of hockey in it and the way both characters interact with it
- Where was the smut in the last like 40% of the book? Where was it?
- Warning major spoiler: Beaus death came too late. It really feels like so much time was spent setting up side characters that the bulk of the story wasn’t really about Allie and Dean and so there was a rush at the end to give them some substance. I liked how this added to the plot, but I think it should’ve been done earlier (honestly the middle chunk of the book was not needed) and been more developed (days just go by and details are just missed that would’ve been included in the first two books of this series). Same with Allie struggling about her future. I wished it focused on these plot points and really developed it instead of introducing a million characters
Overall it was somehow too long while also being underdeveloped and I just don’t think it was really about Allie and Dean and I’m disappointed.
Graphic: Death, Grief, and Alcohol
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Incest, Suicide, and Toxic relationship